Tagged with: Your Stories

Portrait Positive is a groundbreaking project to challenge ideas of beauty. 16 models with a visible difference, including several born with a cleft, had their portraits taken by world-renown photographer Rankin and were featured on Steven Tai's catwalk for London Fashion Week 2018.

"The truth is you never really know what your baby will look like until they are placed in your arms. I’m not going to sit here and lie, I was nervous about seeing her for the first time, but I had nothing to worry about. She was and still is absolutely perfect, cleft lip, cleft palate and gum notch included, this little girl was amazing, and I fell in love with her and her perfect imperfection instantly."

After Ed's amazing efforts were highlighted to us by grateful members of the CLAPA Community, we got in touch with Ed to find out if he'd like to share his story for CLAPA so that we can say a huge thank you for all his hard work.

Carol was born in 1948 with a cleft palate. In this short interview with CLAPA she shares how her confidence has grown over the years, and how she has moved on from being nervous about her speech to facing the crowds with confidence as a spoken word performer.

As part of this short interview with CLAPA, Keith explains how he approaches confidence issues that can come with being born with a cleft, how his surgeries have affected the person he is today, and how grateful he is to the people he has met along the way.

Sabrina decided to get in touch with CLAPA in the hope that parents of children born with a cleft and young people growing up affected by cleft might find it a source of comfort to hear from someone with her experiences.

I am 31 years old and 33 weeks pregnant with my first baby...we decided to have a private scan for peace of mind...during the consultation the sonographer diagnosed the baby with a cleft lip and (possible) palate - just as I was born.

I’ve seen so many people being upset or feeling down because they have a cleft but I don’t it doesn’t really bother me and it shouldn’t really bother other people. I say be proud to have a cleft lip because it shows that we are strong 💪

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